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Horatio Alger Jr.

19th century author known for his manu books in which poor boys become rich through their earnest attitudes and hard work. A true story of spectacular wordly success achieved by someone who started near the bottom is often called "A ___________ Story."

Nathaniel Hawthorne

19th century author known for his novels and short stories that explore themes of sin and guilt. His works include The Scarlet Letter and The House of the Seven Gables.

james fenimore cooper

19th century author known for his work set on the American frontier, such as the series The Leatherstocking Tales. He was america's first major novelist. His stories focused on the frontier, the wilderness beyond, and the sea, creating romances often touched with power and beauty.

Herman Melville

19th century author known for moby dick. in his writing, melville drew on several adventurous years spent at sea.

Emily Dickinson

19th century poet famous for her short, untitled, evocative poems. some of her most famous poems begin " there is no frigate like a book ," "because i could not stop for death/ he kindly stopped for me" "i never saw a moor" and "i'm nobody, who are you?" she wrote 1775 poems, only 7 which ( and these over her protest) were published her lifetime

Washington Irving

19th century writer. His works include "the legend of sleepy hollow" and "rip van winkle."

Louisa May Alcott

19th-century author known for little women and little men, along with other books for and about children.

Eudora Welty

20th Century author who was a southern regional realist. her pictures of 20th century life in rural and small town mississippi accurately reflect both its surfaces and its deeper psycholgical currents. her most famous stories are "why i live at the P.O." and "The purified man."

Eugene O'Neill

20th Century playwright. 3 of his best known plays are A long day's journey into the night, mourning becomes electra, and the iceman cometh. he was the first american playwright of significance and give respectability to the american drama. he won 4 pulitzer prizes & in 1936 won the nobel prize

ralph waldo emerson

20th century author and lecturer. leader of the transcendentalism movement. in his essay self reliance and in other works, he stressed the importance of the individual and encouraged people to rely on their own judgements

john steinbeck

20th century author best known for his novels, including the grapes of wrath, of mice and men, and east of eden. he had his greatest success during the depression of the 1930s and was awarded the nobel prize in 1962.

ralph ellison

20th century author best known for the book The Invisible Man. The novel won the national book award and is regarded as a classic of modern literature. He resisted being categorized as a black writer, aiming his fiction to address the universal human condition

T.S. Eliot

20th century author born and raised in American. He immigrated to England where he wrote poems, plays, and essays, and urged the use of ordinary language in poetry. He was much concerned with the general emptiness of modern life and with the revitilizatilon of religion. Among his best known works are the poems "The love song of J Alfred Prufrock" and " the waste land" and the play Murder in the Cathedral

Dorothy Parker

20th century author known for her often sarcastic wit. She wrote poems, short stories, film scripts, and reviews of plays and books. Her poetry contains some often quoted lines, such as "Men seldom make passes/ at girls who wear glasses."

Sinclair Lewis

20th century author known for his novels to criticize aspects of American life such as small town narrowness, insincere preachers, and the discouragement of scientific curiosity. his books include Babbitt, Elmer Gantry, and Main Street. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in the 1930 for his contributions to literature.

Langston Hughes

20th century author known for his poems about the black experience in the US. He was a leader of the Harlem Renaissance. A well known line from his poem "dream deferred" is "what happens to a dream defered?/ does it dry up like a raisin in the sun?"

Gertrude Stein

20th century author who lived most of her life in France. She wrote her life story as the Autobiography of Alice B. Tokias(her companion) and she is said to have introduced the phase of "lost generation" to describe the americans who wandered about Europe after wwI. Her works include poems and the story collection three lives; and the most famous line from her poetry is "rose is a rose is a rose."

e.e. Cummings

20th century author who spurred the use of many conventions of standard written English in his poetry. He often avoided using capital letters, even in his name and experimented freely with typographic conventions, grammar, and syntax. He wrote poetry on love, the falling of public instiuitions, and many other subjects.

william Faulkner

20th century author whose works, set mostly in the south, include the sound and the fury and as i lay dying. a major writer of his time, he won the nobel prize in 1949. all of his stories are set in the fictional "yoknapatawhpa county." in mississippi

James Baldwin

20th century author whose writings, mostly about the black experience in the US, include novels such as Go Tell It on the Mountain, and essays, such as The Fire Next Time.

ernest hemingway

20th century author. one of the lost generation of americans living in paris during the 1920s. in such books as a farewell to arms, the sun also rises, for whom the bell tolls, and the old man and the sea, he glorified heroic males exploits such as bullfighting, boxing, and safari hunting. he is known for his simple, short sentences and his lively dialogue. he was rewarded for his contribution to literature with the nobel prize in 1954.

Tennessee Williams

20th century writer famous for his plays, which portray violent passions in ordinary people; these plays include A Streetcar named Desire, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, and the Glass Menagerie. From WWII until his accidental death in 1983, he shared with Arthur Miller the distinction of being the foremost American dramatist.

Maya Angelou

20th century writer whose best known work is I know Why the Caged Bird Sings, an autobiographical account of growing up as a black girl in the rural south.

Carl Sandburg

20th-century author . Hid widely-varied works include poems about the countryside and industrial heartland of the U.S., especially Chicago, using the rhythms of their speech, the structure of the way they said things.

john dos passos

20th-century author best known for the three novels that make up the U.S.A. trilogy. He relied heavily on the steam of consciousness effect in his novels.

John Updike

A "new-realist" celebrated for the precision of his style and the painterly way he recreates his fictional worlds. His stories convey his vision of middle America and of the middle class holding onto its style of life while at the same time trying to adjust its mind to new ideas and new social realities. His best works include Rabbit Run and Couples.

Casey Jones

A ballad from the early 20th century about a railroad engineer who dies valiantly in a train wreck.

Walden

A book by Henry David Thoreau describing his two years of life alone at a Pond in Massachusetts He recounts his daily life in the woods, and celebrates nature and the individual's ability to live independently of society A famous line from the book is Thoreau's statement that "the mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation"

Spoon River Anthology

A collection of interrelated poems by Edgar Lee Masters. Masters recreates the fictional town of spoon river and writes in verse the epitaphs of the deceased. Masters villagers speak one after the other from their graves— their understanding of their lies illuminated by death. Masters pictured many vivid characters in the anthology and satirize the relations and hypocrisy of a small town.

Leaves of Grass

A collection of poems by Walt Whitman, written mainly in free verse. Published with revisions every few years in the late 19th century, it contains such well known poems as "I Hear America Singing," "Song of Myself," and "Oh Captain, My Captain."

Flannery O'Connor

A devout catholic in the rural Protestant South. Her intense devotion is present in the situations of her characters, who are frequently grotesque, often eccentric, even dull and decent, or even genuinely satanic. Her fiction with a violence both comical and terrifying. Her works include "A good man is hard to find" and "Good country people."

"Shoot, if you must, this old gray head"

A line from "barbara frietchie." a poem from the civil war years by the poet john greenleaf whlttier, which describes a fictional incident in the war. frietchie aged over 90, displays a union flag when confederate troops march through her town. the soldiers shoot the flag off its staff, but frietchie catches it, leans out the window, and addresses the soliders: "shoot if you must, this gray old head/ but spare your country's flag!' she said."

Transcendentalism

A movement in american literature and thought in the 19th century. it called on people to view the objects in the world as small versions of the whole universe and to trust their individuals intuitions. The two most noted american people that are this were Ralph Waldo Emerson, who wrote "self reliance" and Henry David Thoreau.

The Color Purple

A novel (1982) by Alice Walker. Ceile suffers the poverty, racism, sexual abuse, and ignorance of the Sharecropper family. Through strength of character she endures it all and rises in the end to a severe accommodation to her existence and restoration to those she loves.

ethan frome

A novel by Edith Wharton. the title character is a farmer frustrated in his ambition to become an engineer and in his marriage to a nagging, sour, sickly wife. He falls in love with his wife's cousin. The novel depicts his wasted talents and passions and describes the triumph of a conventional society over the ambitious, creative individual.

the sun also rises

A novel by Ernest Hemingway about a group of young Americans living in Europe in the 1920s. It captures the disillusionment and cynicism of the Lost Generation

the great gasby

A novel by F.Scott Fitzgerald recounting the rise and fall of Jay Gatsby, a millionaire who makes elaborate schemes to win back his former mistress. The novel shows the rise and fall of one man's american dream.

Moby Dick

A novel by Herman Melville. Its central character, Captain Ahab, engages in a mad obsessive quest for Moby Dick, a great white whale. The novel opens with the famous sentence: "Call me Ishmael."

Little Women

A novel by Louisa May Alcott . This story is about four sisters in 19th century growing up in New England.

the adventures of tom sawyer

A novel by Mark Twain. The Title character is a willy and adventurous boy. In one famous episode, Tom Sawyer tricks his friends into painting a fence for him by pretending it is a great privilege and making them pay to take over the job. the adventures of huckleberry finn is a sequel to tom sawyer, huck finn is tom's best friend.

the scarlet letter

A novel by Nathaniel Hawthorne about Hester Prynne, a woman in the 17th century New England who is convicted of adultery At the beginning of the story, she is forced to wear a scarlet letter A on her dress as a sign of her guilt. Hester will not reveal the identity of her partner in adultery. her husband comes to realize who her lover is and takes revenge on him. eventually, her dying lover publicly admits his part in the adultery.

Uncle Tom's Cabin

A novel by harriet beecher stowe; it paints a grimm picture of life under slavery. the title character is a plous, passive slave, who is eventually beaten to death by the overseer simon legree. Published shortly before the civil war, it won support for the antislavery cause. although stowe presents uncle tom as a virtuous man, the expression "uncle tom" is often used today as a term of reproach for a subservient black person tolerates discrimination.

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

A novel by mark twain. huckleberry finn, a boy running away from his father, and his friend jim, a runaway slave, take to the mississippi river on a raft. eventually jim is captured, and huck helps him escape. the lessons huck learns about life are a prevailing theme of the book.

roots

A novel by the 20th century american author alex haley, later made into a popular television drama. it traces a black american man's heritage to africa, where his ancestors had been captured and sold as slaves

gone with the wind

A novel from the 1930s by the American author Margaret Mitchell Set in Georgia during the Civil War, the book tells of the three marriages of the central character, Scarlet O'Hara, and the devastation caused by the war The film version of the 1939 is one of the most successful films ever made

the catcher in the rye

A novel from the 1950s by the American author J.D. Salinger The book relates the experiences of Holden Caulfield, a sensitive but rebellious youth who runs away from his boarding school.

Existentialism

A philosophical movement embracing the view that the suffering individual must create meaning in an unknowable, chaotic, and seemingly empty universe.

Our Town

A play by Thornton Wilder. The play deals with everyday life in a small town in New England.

death of a salesman

A play from the 1940s by Arthur miller. In the play, willie loman, a salesman who finds himself regarded as useless in this occupation because of his age, kills himself. A speech made by a friend of Willy's after his suicide is well known, and it ends with the lines: "nobody dast blame this man. A salesman has got to dream, boy. It comes with the territory."

"casey at the bat"

A poem by Ernest Lawrence Thayer, from the late 19th-century about Casey, an arrogant, overconfident baseball player who brings his team down to defeat by refusing to swing the first two balls pitched to him, and then missing on the third. The poem's final line is, "There is no joy in Mudville- The mighty Casey has struck out."

Paul Revere's Ride

A poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow celebrating the ride made on horseback by Paul Revere to warn the American rebels of approaching British troops. It begins with these lines "Listen, my children, and you shall hear/ of the midnight ride of Paul Revere"

Oh Captain! My Captain!

A poem by Walt Whitman about a captain who dies just as his ship has reached the end of a stormy and dangerous voyage. The captain represents Abraham Lincoln, who was assassinated just after the end of the Civil War.

F. Scott Fitzgerald

A twentieth-century American author known for his short stories and for his novels, including The Great Gatsby and This Side of Paradise. He led a tempestuous life with his wife, Zelda, and was one of several talented Americans, including Ernest Hemingway, who lived in Paris in the 1920s.

Catch 22

A war novel from the 1980's by Joseph Heller. In the novel its a provision in army regulations; it stipulates that a soilder's request be relieved from active duty can be spared the horrors of war id obviously mentally sound, and therefore must stay to fight. Figuratively it is ant absurd arrangement that puts a person in a double bind; for example, a person can't get a job without experience, but can't get experience without a job.

The New Yorker

A weekly magazine known for non fiction and short stories, and for its cartoons, Ogden Nash, Dorothy Parker, and James Thurber are notable authors whose work is regularly in the magazine.

the song of hiawatha

An epic by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, based on the story of an actual Native-American hero The historical Hiawatha was an Onondaga from what is now New York State, but longfellow makes him an ojibwa living near lake superior, the poem begins: by the shores of the gitche gumee by the shining big sea water stood the wigwam of nokomis

Zora Neale Hurston

An important Harlem Renaissance author. Books: Jonah's Gourd Vine, Their Eyes Were Watching God. her writing was very regional and closely followed the speech patterns of central flordia

Scarlett O'Hara

The heroine of the book gone with the wind. She is a shrewd manipulative southern belle who survives two husbands and finally is matched with by a third, Rhett Butler.

Mark Twain

The nom de plume of Samuel L. Clemens, an author and humorist of the late 19 & early 20th century. He is famous for his stories with settings along the Mississippi River; his books include The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Life on the Mississippi, and the Prince and the Pauper, Ernest Hemingway, Americans most noted author, said that all American literature can be traced back to him.

O. Henry

The pen name for William Sydney Porter. 20th-century author known for "the gift of the magi," and other short stories. He specialized in surprising endings and tales filled with irony.

deism

an 18th century enlightenment religion emphasizing reason, not miracles; partly a reaction against calvinism and religious superstition

Enlightenment

an 18th century movement that focused on the ideals of good senses, benevolence, and a belief in liberty, justice, and equality as tbe natural rights of man.

alice walker

an african american and a feminist writer. her fiction draws upon the black experience in the american south and by creating strong women characters of near-heroic achievement, she endows the african american woman with a new identity, born distinct and admirable. in 1982, she won the america book award and the pulitzer prize for her novel the color purple

Civil Disobedience

an essay by henry david thoreau. it contains his famous statement "that government is best which governs least," and asserts that people's obligations to their own conscience take prejudice, over their obligations to their government. thoreau also argues that if, in the following their conscience, people find it necessary to break the laws of the state, they should be prepared to pay penalties, including government. thoreau himself went to jail for refusing to pay a tax to support the mexican war.

Willa Cather

author of the early 20th century known for My Antonia and other novels of frontier life. A regionalist and a realist, she describes the lives of immigration farm people in Nebraska where she grew up.

east of eden

john steinbeck's novel is made up of 3 stories: a history of the salinas valley, the chronicle of two families in the valley, and a recreation of the cain and abel story. in each story the theme is the same; good and evil are always in conflict

modernism

literary movement from the beginning of the 20th century to around 1950. in general, it rejects tradition and has a hostile attitude toward the immediate past. there was much experimentation in literature as authors tried to express the irrational working of the unconscious mind. leading authors in the movement include T.S Eliot, gertrude stein, and ezra pound.

realism

moment in literature in the second half of the 19th century that sought to record accurately the speech and behavior of ordinary people and to depict life honesty, without recourse to melodrama or improbable events. some of the best known are stephen crane. mark twain, edith wharton, and henry james.

robert frost

most popular of the 20th century poets. some of his best works include "the road not taken," stopping by the woods on a snowy evening" (which contains the line "and miles to go before i sleep"), "mending wall," (the source of the line: good fences make good neighbors"), and the gift outright" (which begins with the line: the land was ours before we were the land's)

my antonia

novel by willa cather. It is the story of a bohemian girl whose family came from the old country to settle on the open prairies of nebraska. while she lives on her farm and tills the soil, she is the child of the prairie, but when antonia goes to the city, she faces heartbreak, disillusionment, and social ostracism. only after her return to the land, which is her heritage, does she find peace and meaning of life.

local color writing

the civil war and the rapid extension of railroads that followed awakened an new interest among americans in the regions and localities of their reunited nation. one interest was the emergence of regional writing and local color. the writers included sarah orne jewett and mary e wilkins freeman in new england, charles w chestnutt in the mid atlantic south, kate chopin in the deep south, hamlin garland in the midwest, and bret harte in the far west.

the old man and the sea

the novel that ensured ernest hemingway the nobel prize. old santiago seeks to end 84 straight days w/o catching a single fish. the story examines the unconquerable spirit of man & is filled with religious symbols & metaphors

Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass

The autobiography of the abolitionist Frederick Douglas. Published in 1945 when Douglas was only 27, the book tells the story from childhood until his escape to freedom at the age of 20.

Captain Ahab

The captain of the ship, the Pequod, in Moby Dick by James Melville. He is obsessed with capturing the great white whale, Moby Dick.

Natty Bumppo

The central character in The Leatherstocking Tales by James Fenimore Cooper. Natty, a settler, is taught by the native Americans and adopts their way of life.

simon legree

The cruel overseer of slaves in Uncle Tom's Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe. Though the book describes conditions in the slaveholding states of the South, Legree, the most vicious character in it, is from New England.

"the land was ours before we were the lands.."

The first line of the poem "The Gift Outright" by Robert Frost.

The Beat Poets

A group flourishing in the 1980's that emphasized mysticism and rejection of social taboos. Within the "beat" counterculture, the poet is a central figure, a guru of sorts, whose style of living, as much as his poetry, challenges social values and offers moral and spiritual instruction. Alan Ginsberg and Gary Snyder were leaders of the movement.

Lost Generation

A group of American writers who lived and wandered in Europe during and after WWI. they were called "lost" because after the war many of them were disillusioned with the world in general snd unwilling to move into a settled life. Gertrude Stein is usually credited with popularizing the expression. The characters of the book The sun Also rises, by Ernest Hemmingway, are often mentioned as examples of this.

"the fall of the house of the usher"

A horror story by Edgar Allan Poe. At the end of the story, two of the family fall dead, and the ancestral mansion of the Ushers splits in two and sinks into a lake

rose is a rose is a rose

A line by Gertrude Stein, suggesting, perhaps, that some things resist definition in words

the secret life of walter mitty

A short story by James Thurber about a henpecked husband with extravagant daydreams He imagines himself as a heroic pilot in wartime ,a world famous surgeon, and a soldier who can face a firing squad without fear An ordinary person who dreams of leading a romantic life may be called a "Walter Mitty"

The Gift of the Magi

A short story by O. Henry. An extremely poor young couple is determined to give Christmas gives to each other. He sells his watch to buy a set of combs for her long hair. She cuts off all her hair and sells it to buy him a watch band.

Rip Van Winkle

A story by Washington Irving. The title character goes to sleep after a game of bowling and much drinking in the mountains with a band of dwarves. He awakens 20 years later, an old man. He finds that all has changed, his wife is dead, his daughter is married, and the American Revolution has taken place.

poet laureate

American's national poet. The position was created in 1985, and Robert Penn Warren was appointed in 1986. Robert PInksy is this in 2000.

Puritanism

Emerged in England around the middle 1500's. Its aim was to "purify" the Church of England. The term is frequently used to refer to strictly, even rigidly moral attitude.

Arthur Miller

He shares with Tennessee Williams the distinction of being the best american dramatist from wwII to the present. William's plays are based on emotion, often looking at the struggle between right and wrong, the american myth of success, generation gaps, and siblings with contrasting values, His most famous plays are death of a salesman and the crucible.

Harlem Renaissance

Name given to the period from the end of WWI and through the middle of the 1930s Depression, during which a group of talented African American writers produced a sizable body of literature in the four prominent genres of poetry, fiction, drama, and essay. Common themes included alteration and the use of the blues tradition. Major writers included Countee Cullen, Langston Hughes, Zora Neal Hurston, Jean Toomer, and Anna Bontemps.

For Whom the Bell Trolls

Novel by Ernest Hemingway set in the Spanish Civil War. The title is taken from a line in sermon by English essayist and poet John Donne.

saul bellow

Perhaps the foremost among the American novelists who came into prominence after WWII, 1976 Nobel Prize winner Bellow is a part of the novelistic mainstream. His books have the rich flavor of his urban Jewish upbringing. Henderson the Rain King and Herzog are his two most famous works.

nobel prize

Prizes given annually for achievement in eight fields, including literature. The awards are considered a mark of world-wide leadership in which they are given. A cash prize of up to one million dollars is given to each winner.

Pulitzer prize

The prestigious awards given annually for excellence in American journalism, literature, and music.

The reports of my death are greatly exaggerated

The text of a cable sent by Mark Twain from London to the press in the United States after his obituary had been mistakenly published. Twain was to die at the age of 75 on his birthday. His birth and death were both marked by Hayley's comet.

poor richard's almanack

a collection of periodicals ( each was called poor richard/ poor richard improved) be benjamin franklin, issued over 25 in the middle of the 18th century. they contain humor, information, and proverbial wisdom, such as "early to bed and early to rise / makes a man healthy , wealthy , and wise"

naturalism

a literary movement that shares with realism its attention to the speech and behavior of the present, but considers people's behaviors to be determined by social and economic forces beyond human control. some of the best known naturalists are Frank Norris and Stephen Crane.

the last of the mohicans

a novel by james fenimore cooper, part of the leather stocking tales. the main character, natty bumppo

rabbit run

a novel by john updike. since his glory days of high school basketball, rabbit angstrom's life has gone gently downhill. he reacts to his growing despair by abandoning his mistress and his wife and while running away and running away into aimless drifting

"The village Blacksmith"

a poem by henry wadsworth longfellow about a village blacksmith in new england, it begins: under the spreading chestnut tree the village smithy stands the smith, a mighty man he is with large & sinewy hands

good country people

a story by flannery o'conner. satan appears in the form of an suave young bible salesman who comes to the well-to-do farm of the divorced mrs. hopewell and her crippled Ph.D daughter hugla

Legend of Sleeping Hollow

a story by washington irving. its central character, ichabod crane, is a vain and cowardly teacher, and he rivals brom bones for the love of a woman. Bones terrorizes crane by disguising himself as a legendary headless horseman.